


Paper Flowers

by LamiaHypnosia



Series: Dies Irae [1]
Category: The Outer Worlds (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Dark, Blood and Violence, Character Death, Death, Drama, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Murder, Oneshot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-06
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:22:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26863603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LamiaHypnosia/pseuds/LamiaHypnosia
Summary: Thirty five years ago Phineas Welles had it all. A loving wife and daughter, a prestigious career among Halcyon's elite.When he discovered the truth about the missing colony ship, The Hope, Phineas knew he would have to choose between his life and several hundred thousand.
Series: Dies Irae [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2001835
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	Paper Flowers

**Author's Note:**

> Hhhhokay. So. I don't normally do grimdark shit but I said 'hey you know what, I wanna do a depressing as shit AU where Phineas had a family before all the BS started.' 
> 
> This is also partly based off Phineas pondering about what if he and Kenna were both born in Halcyon and they got married.  
> Bad things, Phineas! Bad things would happen.

Phineas was hardly in the door before he called out “Kenna! Kenna we have to go, we have to leave, now!”

Racing across the foyer, into the living room Phineas called out “Kenna?” He called again. “Kat?” 

The pistol felt heavy in his hand. He knew coming back here was idiotic and prayed the scramble he’d done to the tracking signal would buy him enough time to gather his family and run. He knew this could also be a trap and the gun shook, for he had no experience with weapons fearing that it might be his first impulse to fire. Deep breaths. Calm down.

He’d been so careful, too. Neither his parents nor his wife knew what Phineas was doing. The colonists left to sleep forever in the void. He could wake them safely, he knew he could. The closest he came to being caught was when a good deal of bits had been removed from their savings. Kenna had cried when she realized it was gone but Phineas knew exactly where it went -buying chemicals on the black market for his experiments- resorting to borrowing money to make up the difference spinning some yarn about how it was a bank error and he had them fix it. 

He couldn’t stand lying to his wife but once he presented the Board with a walking talking subject he would tell them everything and pray Kenna didn’t leave him because what else was he lying about. Surely she wouldn’t leave him but she might find it hard to trust him again. Phineas didn’t care, when it was over he’d tell her and he would do anything, anything to rebuild that trust. 

Against social trends or his parents’ request Phineas married for love. Her name was Kenna, a strikingly beautiful woman from one of the dinky little Rizzo’s vendors who always put on a genuine smile for him. He found himself using all his corporate mandated breaks talking to her, about her, thinking about her and at last it was she who asked him out for coffee. And from there began a romance worthy of a serial. Phineas found himself pausing to gaze wistfully out the window at the green hills of Terra 2, envisioning walking arm in arm with Kenna through the little wooded area, wind playing with her golden hair. His colleagues rolled their eyes. Law, there was nothing more irritating than a man in love.

She was hesitant when he asked her to marry him because she feared that the corporation would reassign them. Emboldened by love Phineas told her that no corporation could ever control how he felt about her. It had taken convincing but it was all there, legal fair and square. Plus happy couples could produce new workers.  
A peculiar arrangement in everyone’s mind plus they lived modestly. They looked upon him with more than a little envy.

Phineas had paid little mind that Kenna wasn’t feeling well one day- she did devour spicy and otherwise heavy foods so it was a wonder she didn’t feel unwell before then. She made some off-handed comment about maybe she was pregnant as casually as though she was remembering where she left her keycard while Phineas’ stomach dropped.  
Rizzo’s gave her what they called ‘extended maternity leave’ when it was really just a lay off as selling Lemon Slapp and Purpleberry Munch to weary workers returning home from a long shift was decidedly less important than Phineas’ work. He was okay with that. He made more than enough bits to take care of her but the trade off was he never saw her much.

It wasn’t until one night when he was returning home that Phineas realized he had a daughter. Kenna was dozing on the sofa with the newborn in her arms and he melted at the sight of them. He managed to take the baby in his arms, marvel at her tiny hands, rosebud mouth and dusting of blonde hair. She would be a golden beauty like her mother. 

Until she began to fuss which startled Kenna awake with a sleepy ‘oh crap, the baby!’ She found Phineas holding the infant with tears streaming down his cheeks  
"Look, we made this!" Kenna had said, smiling through her exhaustion. They stayed up all night admiring the swaddled pink treasure though Phineas would never forgive himself for not being there during the birth. It was gross and she was glad he didn’t watch her suffer, Kenna told him later. 

Kathryn - named after Phineas' mother- little Kat was the light of his life. Her middle name, Temperance, came from a long tradition in Kenna’s family of naming girls after virtues which had blessedly passed over her but they had to make a concession to both of Kat's grandmothers. It was only fair.

No matter how exhausted he was from the day’s work all Phineas had to do was come home and see his family. He felt a little guilty for his absence but nevertheless Kenna greeted him as enthusiastically as she had in the early days of their courtship. For his part Phineas could not possibly love her more. Kenna poured herself into raising their daughter. They might have had other children but even the Byzantines had limits placed on them. Phineas knew Kenna wanted a dozen children and he would give them to her if it were permitted. 

Kat grew like a weed but when she started talking, that was the real fun. She chattered endlessly about the serials she watched, the food she’d eaten, something funny Mommy did and boasted to her grandparents she’d build a time machine. The time machine was a phase that lasted years, her imagination stirred by a serial she’d watched repeatedly.  


Kenna sewed up the sleeves of one of Phineas’ old lab coats and Kat would wear it as she zipped around the house with her spaceships aloft, playing out exciting adventures from what she’d seen on the aetherwave and eventually from her own imagination.

In all ways she delighted him though he was a little disappointed that her eyes were grey like his own and not the striking dark blue as her mother. Phineas’ father Alfred commented that Little Kat had her mother’s looks and her father’s intelligence, a dangerous combination. Kenna's parents were cold as their surname implied and while they cooed over their granddaughter, sent gifts they weren't in Kat's life all that much, just as they were barely in Kenna's. Phineas' parents adored Kat, _adored_ her.

Phineas’ mother was Big Kat to her granddaughter and the two had a very secret club. Alfred read old Earth stories to Kat as she sat in his lap or tucked under his arm as he had done with Phineas as a boy. He didn't even mind reading the same story over and over again, until he could recite it and Phineas loved to watch his father become so animated, waving his arms, using different voices for the characters.

But the house was quiet. Kenna wasn’t laughing at her serials or painting her toenails or Kat playing with her toy spaceships, racing around wearing his lab coat with the hem dragging the floor. Phineas’ heart ached with nostalgia and the sudden realization that this house with all its memories would have to be left behind.  
There was no little golden haired child stampeding around the house exploring the cosmos and Phineas’ building panic urged him onward. He did a full sweep of the house- no guards, thankfully. But neither hide nor hair of his wife or daughter.

“Kat? Are you hiding? Daddy’s here, it’s safe. Hiding, that’s my smart girl. Come on, we have to go. Let’s find Mommy.”

His breath caught as the door of the master bedroom slid open. Hidden partially under a table he saw Kenna’s bare legs. In an adrenaline fueled burst of energy Phineas dropped the gun and shoved the table knocking over photographs sending knickknacks crashing to the floor. Panic clawed at him.

“Kenna! Kenna, where is Kat?”

Kenna did not stir. Then he saw it. The entire front of her shirt was the color of rust. Letting out a small dreadful sound Phineas brushed back her hair and touched her face.  
“Kenna!” he said, hoping she'd open her eyes.  
No. No she can’t be dead. But two fingers to her carotid artery told the truth. She was still warm, a line of blood ran down the corner of her mouth. Phineas shook her a little. His mouth went dry.

"KENNA!" 

Pulling her into his arms he touched his forehead to hers.  
He sobbed. Sobbed until his chest burned for air. He had not cried this much since his father died and the grief hit him in full. He’d woken in the middle of the night and Kenna comforted him, holding him and saying nothing. 

But that was merely sadness, nostalgia. This was burning rage, shock, horror. He knew he’d lose his father that didn’t make it easier but his wife, his best friend, his love was dead- his light, mother of his precious little sunbeam, murdered. And it was his fault. She hadn't been dead long, either. If he'd come back sooner- he couldn't have saved her but he could have told her goodbye, that he was sorry. Not let her die alone in this empty house.

The Board owns everything and they can take it away. Someone said that to Phineas once, who was it? That didn’t matter. He held her heedless of the red stain transferring to his lab coat, held her and sobbed, giving into rage at the Board but mostly at himself for permitting this to happen. 

Phineas sat there until his legs were numb. Kenna’s mortal vessel was becoming pale. He couldn’t bring himself to leave her but this was one of her practical jokes, albeit a morbid one. She’d wake up, wipe the Catch Up off her cheek, kiss him, laugh and say ‘gotcha!’. Phineas chuckled. Then more, still sobbing. He laugh-cried for a moment, feeling a bit dizzy.

The video screen lit up.

“Welles.”  
The woman on the video screen said evenly. “I trust you’ve received our message.”

Still holding his wife’s stiffening body close, curled in his lap as he used to hold her, Phineas turned to the video screen. “I received your damn message. The Board is invincible, we can murder innocent women in their home.” Raising a finger he pointed at the camera, words dripping venom. “You found me, now why don’t you run to your mistress, report back like a good dog and maybe you’ll get a pat on the head.”

Something flickered across the lieutenant’s gaze, an emotion she had tried and failed to conceal. Something like shock and perhaps regret. “That wasn’t supposed to happen.” She said aloud.

Phineas ignored her. “I know you’ve been tailing me for a month since I found out about the Hope. Adjutant Carew will be interested to know, so run off and tell her. I’m beaten. You hit me right in my Achilles' heel. Go on, Lieutenant Mobberly, I’m sure there’s a big promotion in it for you!”

“No,” Mobberly corrected, then said almost to herself “She must have resisted. Damn.”

Phineas exploded. “Now you’re upset your negotiations are going sour! Void take you and your whole damned Board! Damn you all!"

“When you were told to keep quiet about the Hope, you didn’t listen. You were given ample opportunities to cease, and you did not. Why?”

“I know everything. I can revive these colonists, I know I can. I just need more time-” Phineas touched Kenna’s face, her still beautiful face, holding her to him as he did so often and never often enough.

She dismissed him with a flap of her hand. “You’re a murderer, Welles! I can’t have monsters like you loose in the world.”

Phineas froze. His eyes fell on Kenna's body. The room swirled around him, this house full of precious memories. Kenna had taken the modest home and made it a refuge, and when Kat came it was the finishing touch to a masterpiece. That’s all it was now. A museum to the life of a man who gave up this house to save the colony. 

“Aren’t you interested in your daughter’s whereabouts?” 

Phineas slowly turned back to the screen. “How do I know you haven’t done something to her already?”

“I wouldn’t harm a child.” Mobberly said with quiet conviction.

The video cut to Kat sitting on a bench . A woman kneeling before her talking in a low voice. “I WANT my DADDY. “ Kat said loudly. Of course. She always wanted Daddy first. 

“Here she is. She’s a fighter too. No tears at all. You must be proud of her. I’m giving you one chance. You will return to Kolway and we will compensate you for your loss. We will return your child-”

His fingers found the pistol. Clenching his jaw Phineas raised the gun and fired at the screen, rocking with the recoil. The glass shattered, the monitor exploded in a shower of sparks.  
Phineas stared around the ruined room, the stench of blood and gunpowder in his nostrils. He was going to be sick.

What now?

Kenna was dead, Kat would be raised to be as brainwashed and the others. The UDL would come for him and haul him to Tartarus for this. But the Hope. 

Hope remains.

Even if she never knew it, Phineas would give hope to his daughter.

The next few minutes were a blur. Blink. He’d placed Kenna in the bed they’d shared for nearly a decade. Up late reading, watching serials, resting during sickness, talking in the dark, making love. His heart ached remembering the last time they’d been together. And now she was gone.

Leaning down Phineas touched his forehead to Kenna’s. “My darling. Please forgive me.”

Blink. The kitchen.

Blink. The living room.

A paper flower garland Kat had made. Phineas tore it from the wall. 

Fumes. Sparks. Smoke. Get out now. Get out and run. 

The paper garland was still in his hand as he watched his house burn.

**Author's Note:**

> The feels on the bus go round and round, round and round, round and round, the feels on the bus go round and round...
> 
> So this is probably gonna be the start of an entire dark AU series that will probably get going more once Royalties is done and I've rested my brainmeats a while.


End file.
